


Denial and Dumbassery

by tinylilremus



Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti)
Genre: Absolutely zero scary clowns have ever existed in Derry, Dungeons and Dragons as flirting, Fluff, Getting Together, M/M, Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-01
Updated: 2019-10-01
Packaged: 2020-11-09 10:37:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,408
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20852057
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tinylilremus/pseuds/tinylilremus
Summary: Richie Tozier was an open book – some would call it the best thing about him, others would argue that it was the most annoying thing about him.There were only two secrets that Richie fiercely guarded. One: he had been desperately and completely inconveniently in love with his best friend, Eddie Kaspbrak, for years now, and two: Richie liked – no,loved– playing Dungeons and Dragons.





	Denial and Dumbassery

Richie Tozier was an open book – some would call it the best thing about him, others would argue that it was the most annoying thing about him. While it was true that you were never unsure of where you stood with Richie, there was also almost nothing others would classify as too much information that Richie wouldn’t feel comfortable sharing. They knew when he was angry, they knew when he was scared shitless about his Calc test, they knew when he’d eaten food that was more than a bit past its sell-by date as a dare and all about the day of spectacular gastrotechnics that followed, they knew (in great detail) when he’d found a new supermodel that he considered attractive, they knew when he had fought with his parents, and they knew when he was feeling particularly sentimental about his group of friends.

There were only two secrets that Richie fiercely guarded. One: he had been desperately and completely inconveniently in love with his best friend, Eddie Kaspbrak, for years now, and two: Richie liked – no, _loved_ – playing Dungeons and Dragons.

He hadn’t meant to enjoy it as much as he did. He’d only agreed to sit in on a few sessions because one of the girls from his Drama class told him it was really good way to improve his storytelling and improv skills, but after one session of being sucked up into the world that Will Jones, the Dungeon Master, had spun and being frustrated at not being able to influence the decisions the party made, Richie was hooked. He had spent all of that night creating his character and eagerly (though stealthily) handed his character’s backstory to Will at school the next day.

And that had been that. His little Gnome Cleric had been a vital part of the party for the past six months and Richie couldn’t remember what life was before he started playing.

Of course, finding excuses to duck out of plans with six other friends had proven more difficult than he initially thought it would. Though the party only met to play every second Friday, it was often when the rest of the group had made plans for a movie night or a night swim at the quarry and finding excuses to not be there was tricky. Though the excuse he’d finally settled on was guitar lessons, he could almost feel how annoyed the rest of them were each time he flaked out and though he felt bad about it, D&D had become too important to give up.

The only one who seemed to understand was Eddie, who had started tutoring to make a bit of extra cash on the same Fridays that Richie had D&D and as such was also subject to the ire of the group.

Eddie, however, had a far shorter fuse for these things than Richie did.

“Could you all just give Richie a fucking break?” he snapped one Thursday when Bill had complained about them never hanging out together anymore. “We’re in our junior year. Shit’s getting busy. You can’t accuse us of being shitty friends just because we’ve got other things going on. He’s trying his best and so am I, so back the fuck off.”

Richie had wanted to kiss him – even more so when he’d given him a shy glance afterwards to make sure he hadn’t overstepped.

Though honestly, there weren’t many times when Richie didn’t want to kiss him.

The Loser’s Club had backed off a bit after that, and it had become a routine for them to schedule their movie nights on the weeks where Richie and Eddie could make it. It had also become a routine for Eddie to come over to Richie’s place the day after the Fridays where they couldn’t hang out.

This Saturday was no different, apart from the fact that Eddie wasn’t quite himself. He’d sensed that something was wrong as soon as he opened the door, but when Eddie didn’t even fight him over which movie to watch, Richie knew for sure there was something up.

“Hey, are you okay, Eds?” asked Richie, setting down the VHS tape he was about to put on. “You seem a little down.”

“I’m fine,” said Eddie, but he chewed his bottom lip the way he always did when he was lying.

“No you’re not,” Richie replied, crossing the living room to sit next to him on the sofa. “It’s not your mom again is it?”

“No, not this time,” he replied, his face screwing up when he realised that he’d just admitted he wasn’t fine. “It’s really stupid.”

“If it’s making you this upset, it’s not stupid to me.”

Eddie looked up at him then and Richie’s heart jumped to his throat. He knew he was being reckless, that being this soft with Eddie would lead to him working it out, but he couldn’t imagine being snarky when Eddie looked so sad.

Eddie heaved a deep sigh.

“Okay, well, it’s my, uh, my babysitting.”

“You mean your tutoring?”

“Yeah, what did I say?” asked Eddie, eyes wide and cheeks flooding with colour.

“You said ‘babysitting’.”

“Fuck. Well, I meant tutoring.” He was looking down at his hands now, red-faced. “It, uh, it didn’t work out. I got let go.”

“Ah man, I’m sorry to hear that,” said Richie, placing a comforting hand on his shoulder. “Do you maybe want to ditch the movie and go for ice-cream instead? You seem like you need sugar. My treat, since you’re broke now that you’ve lost your job.”

“Ha fucking ha,” Eddie replies, and though he rolls his eyes, he’s grinning. “You know me, I’d never say no to ice-cream.”

“Thought so,” laughed Richie.

Half an hour later, they were sitting on a patch of grass near the river, quietly eating their desserts. What he appreciated about hanging out with Eddie was that the silences between them were never awkward. He didn’t feel the need to fill the air with the sound of his voice, because it was always so comfortable between them. When Richie was with Eddie, he could just be.

“Thanks for this, Rich,” said Eddie, finishing up the last of his cone. “I needed it.”

“Anytime,” said Richie, lying back in the grass to look up at the sky now that he had finished his own. “Don’t stress about it though, alright? We can find you another kid to tutor.”

Eddie sighed and lay down next to Richie, propping himself up on his elbow to look at him.

“To tell you the truth, I wasn’t… I wasn’t actually tutoring anyone.”

Richie frowned and propped himself up on his elbows too.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean that I lied about the tutoring because I didn’t want you or the rest of the Losers to know what I was really doing.”

“Okay, so what _were_ you doing?” asked Richie. “Since you telling me the truth now obviously means that you want to let me in on the big secret.”

“You swear you won’t laugh?”

“Oh, my dear Spaghetti, I can promise you a great many things, but that is not one of them.” The crease in Eddie’s brow deepened. “But I can promise you that, depending on how serious this is, I will at least try not to laugh.”

Eddie rolled his eyes.

“I suppose that’s as good as I’m going to get from you. Fine. The truth is that instead of tutoring every second Friday like I told you, ivebeeninadungeonsanddragonsgroupwithsomeoftheavguysforthepastfewmonths.”

“Jesus Christ, Kaspbrak, slow your roll,” said Richie, turning to his side to face Eddie better. “Tell me again, but slowly.”

“I’ve been in a Dungeons and Dragons group with some of the AV guys for the past few months,” Eddie repeated, his face the reddest Richie had ever seen it. Richie had been fully prepared to laugh or at least suppress a laugh, but none came. He was too astounded to hear that Eddie played D&D to do anything except stare at him. “At least I was until Steve, you know the president of the AV club? He said that because Grant and Matt can’t sort out their shit, he’s dissolving our party. That’s why I was upset earlier. And, yeah, I get that probably makes me more of a fucking loser than the rest of the other Losers, but I was really enjoying it. I wasn’t expecting to like it as much as I do, but it’s been really fun. See I play this Bard who’s less of a musician and more of a stand-up comedian and I’m starting to get really good at getting into character. He’s so different to me and it was just nice to be able to stop being Eddie Kaspbrak for a few hours to be someone else, you know. And I just –“

Richie places a hand on Eddie’s arm and his words, which had been flying at a mile a minute a moment ago, suddenly falter.

“You don’t have to justify it to me,” he said, knowing he should probably take his hand back now that Eddie had calmed, but somehow not being able to work up the will to. “If you enjoy it, fuck the rest of them, right?”

And it was at that point that he totally meant to tell Eddie that he was doing the same thing with his Fridays – that the two of them had been keeping the same damn secret for half a year – but it was also at that point that he felt Eddie’s lips crash into his.

Richie’s brain shut down. Eddie, Eddie who he’d been in love with for years, was kissing him. _Eddie _was kissing _him._ But no sooner had his brain began whirring back to life than Eddie was pulling back with a look of horror.

“Oh my god, Richie, I don’t know what I was thinking, I’m so fucking sorry I–“

“Hey, Eddie,” said Richie, smiling as he slid his hand from Eddie’s shoulder to his burning cheek. “Don’t be.”

And all thoughts of dungeons or dragons or the president of the AV club left his mind as he kissed Eddie, enjoying the taste of vanilla ice-cream on the lips he’d been dreaming about for so long, enjoying the way that Eddie’s fingers began tangling through his hair, enjoying his soft laugh as they pulled apart again, and especially enjoying the euphoria rising in him at the realisation that this meant that Eddie felt the same way. He was looking at Richie shyly through his long lashes the way he often did, but now he finally knew what that look meant.

“For what it’s worth,” he said, brushing back a tendril of soft dark hair that had flopped across Eddie’s forehead, “though I totally get the appeal of wanting to be someone else for a few hours, I happen to like Eddie Kaspbrak. Like, a lot.”

“He likes you too,” Eddie replied. “Like, a lot.”

There was no way he was changing trajectory now to tell Eddie his other secret. Not when Eddie was scooting closer to wrap his arms around him, not when the two of them were lying together watching the blue sky turn from orange to pink and eventually deep blue, both the happiest they had been in years.

He later realised of course – long after Eddie finally announced that he should head home, long after the hour it had taken them to finally move after this announcement, long after trying to bring it up during the car ride home, though being unable to find the moment to – that there was no longer a good time to tell Eddie that he also played D&D, not without an unnecessarily awkward conversation.

He had missed his window and now he hoped and prayed that another would miraculously show up.

* * *

The next two weeks were the best of Richie’s life so far. Though he and Eddie had both agreed to keep it quiet for the time being, there were so many stolen glances, and brushes of skin and kisses that the secret felt less like a burden and more like a covert and daring mission. So far it seemed that the Losers suspected nothing, to the point that they had even gotten away with holding hands the whole way through that week’s movie night without anyone noticing.

As the two of them lived the closest to each other, they spent every moment they could at each other’s houses (though mostly at Richie’s – his parents were far more prone to knocking than Mrs Kaspbrak was). Despite all the time that they spent together, however, Richie still hadn’t found a good way of telling Eddie that he was in a D&D party. He fully acknowledged how ridiculous his situation was – he couldn’t bring himself to say it, though he also couldn’t imagine that Eddie would be too upset if he just told him and it would mean that he could potentially invite him to join their party. Their party could do with a Bard. The rest of the drama kids were too focused on exploring the tragedy of their backstories and the idea of having Eddie’s quick wit and banter at the table was a glorious one.

There was just no good fucking way to bring it up.

It was getting to the point by Thursday evening where he found himself, for the first time ever, dreading the next session. He knew he had to tell him – he wasn’t going to give Eddie a sloppy excuse – but he was already curling into a ball at the embarrassing idea of not only having to admit to Eddie that he also played D&D, but also that, for whatever reason, he had felt too awkward to talk about it until then.

Thankfully, he was saved from having to do anything when a beaming Eddie stopped by Richie’s place on his way home.

“I can’t stay – my mom’s inviting people over tonight so I have to help her set up. I just wanted to let you know that I found another group that plays D&D and I’m starting with them tomorrow. I don’t even have to change my time slot.”

“That’s great,” Richie said, pulling Eddie into a hug just as the pager in his pocket started beeping.

“Shit, that’s my mom. We’re still on for Saturday, right?”

“Always.” Richie kissed Eddie on the cheek and when it looked like he was lingering at the hope of more, Richie laughed and nudged him out the door. “Go, you dork. The last thing we need is your mom not letting you come over anymore because she thinks I’m trying to kidnap you or some bullshit.”

“Miss you already,” said Eddie and though Richie vowed he would never, _ever_, be one of those couples, the sentiment made his stomach somersault.

“Miss you too,” said Richie, closing the door before he said anything more cliché and sappy than that.

Richie got to Will’s house early the next night to help set up the game table and set out chairs.

“Are you alright there?” his friend asked, giving him a curious look. “You’re kinda bouncy today.”

“I have ADHD – I’m always bouncy.”

“You know what I mean,” scoffed Will. “It’s like you have an extra spring in your step or something.”

For a brief moment, Eddie’s face popped into his head and Richie couldn’t keep himself from grinning.

“I guess I’m just really looking forward to tonight’s session,” he replied and though Will still looked curious, he didn’t press the matter further.

“Oh shit, before I forget,” Will said, taking a tray of pizza rolls out the oven, “we have a new guy joining us tonight.”

It took every one of Richie’s spider-man reflexes not to drop the bowl of chips he was setting out.

“Oh yeah?” he asked, hoping his voice sounded casual and not like his blood was suddenly pounding in his ears.

“Yeah. Steve Himble from the AV club says that two of his players were giving him shit so he decided to just stop the game, but he’d invited this guy from his Biology class to join them and he feels shitty that he dissolved the party just as he was starting to really get into it. Apparently, he’s really good. He’s playing a Bard, so that should be fun.”

“Yeah,” Richie replied, not sure what else to say. Was it too late to fake being sick to avoid the situation that was rapidly hurtling towards him?

The crunch of tyres in the driveway answered that question for him.

When the rest of the party had arrived and there was no sign of Eddie, Richie began to hope against all hope that Eddie had chickened out or that he wasn’t going to show, but there was a damning knock at the door five minutes later. Eddie strolled into the room a moment later, as adorable as he always was, cheeks flushed because he was no doubt embarrassed to be the last to arrive.

“Hey, sorry I’m late,” he said as he strode towards the table. “I took a wrong turn and I got…”

His voice trailed off as his eyes locked with Richie’s and Richie, unsure of what else he could do to make the situation less awkward, waved at him.

“No worries, Eddie,” said Will. “We usually just talk bullshit for the first half an hour anyway. I take it you know Richie?”

“Yeah, we’re friends,” Eddie replied, pulling his eyes away from Richie to introduce himself to the rest of the party. When he took the seat next to Richie, Richie was certain that his heart was visibly thudding like in a Tex Avery cartoon.

“Sorry, Eds, I meant to tell you, but the moment passed on the first day and I wasn’t sure how to bring it up again without looking like a dumbass,” Richie whispered.

“The good news is that you don’t need to worry about _looking_ like a dumbass,” Eddie replied under his breath as he set out his character sheet, notebook, and dice, “because you _are_ one. And I’d be a lot madder at you if it wasn’t just such a fucking relief to see you here.”

He threaded his fingers through Richie’s under the table, and Richie beamed at him. The crisis had been averted.

Eddie was as good as Will said he was. It became instantly clear from the moment he opened his mouth that he was just what the party needed. His Bard was snarky, impulsive and had a witty comeback for almost everything. Richie had been right in his guess that they would role-play well together – their characters bantered back and forth seamlessly and it filled Richie with pride to see the rest of the party laughing at Eddie’s clever one-liners. It was also the best feeling in the world to glance over at the person he loved more than anyone else in the world and know that he was enjoying all of this as much as he was.

While in combat with several wyverns that had suddenly snuck up on the party, Eddie nudged Richie, pushing his notebook closer so that he could read what he had scribbled there.

_Salvan is kinda based on you, just so you know._

Richie couldn’t stop the grin that spread across his face, despite the twenty points of damage Lucy’s character took just then. He scrawled his reply beneath Eddie’s message, the words curving up because of the angle he was writing at.

_Pips is kinda based on you too._

Eddie gave him a confused look and began writing again.

_An angry little gnome cleric? I don’t get it._

Richie raised an eyebrow at him.

_Think about it, babe. You’re obsessed with making the people around you better – healing – and you hold a disproportionate amount of rage for someone so small._

Eddie narrowed his eyes at Richie after reading the note, but the corners of his mouth betrayed his amusement.

_Fuck you so much, Tozier._ **♡**

Richie’s stomach flipped at the little heart next to his name, and he smiled softly to himself as he penned his reply.

_Fuck you too, Kaspbrak. _ **♡♡**

Eddie blushed, and Richie wondered how he had gotten so lucky. For the first time in years, he officially had no secrets.

_Well,_ he mused as he took Eddie’s hand again under the table, _at least not from him._


End file.
